They’re been skyping for almost a year. That would be an awfully long con.
Have fun on your adventure. Photocopy your passport, and keep it in a separate place as your real one.
A long con… who’s ever heard of those?
And I appreciate someone playing devils advocate and running through the scenarios I may not have considered.
I mean, all one needs to do is Google “Filipina dating scams” to know this is something very common, with myriad variations on how they go about hoodwinking their victims.
Just sayin’, but you must know since you were very close to becoming one yourself not long ago.
There are scammers, but there are legit people, too. I just did a fiancée visa and then a green card for a lovely young Filipina who married a nice American boy. She was much younger (and cuter) than he was, but he is pretty darn wealthy. She seems very sweet and genuine. I would never marry the dude, no matter how rich, but that’s me. They each seem satisfied with the arrangement (who knows whether it will last? But that’s not my problem) – he gets a wife who is much younger and hotter than she is, and she gets to leave the Philippines and live in a nice place in the States and travel and shop a lot. It’s not a marriage I would choose to enter into, but I have a different set of options. It seems to work OK for them.
So long story short, be careful, but to each his (or her) own.
Eva Luna, Immigration Paralegal
Yup part of my plan includes a flash drive that will actually be laced into my boots (all aluminum housing and clip so its not going to break off) It has copies of contact info itinerary, basic medical history, travel insurance info, scans of passport, credit cards, etc.
We use these drives at my shop for dumping customer personal data to when recovering from an impractical to fix machine.
Yup and I have read many of those horror stories. 95%+ it always revolves around sending money ahead of time. Sure the family may make its money luring in westerners to kill and bury on their property after draining their bank accounts if thats the case I’m probably toast…but hey it was a fun idea…
As a small business owner I am also very familiar with various flavors of how people wheel, deal, and try to game you. Not saying I am immune, but its not my first rodeo.
This is actually attempt #3 #2 was cancelled due to Typhoon Hiyan I sent that woman some money ($200) I volunteered, she did not ask or even hint. Shortly thereafter she started asking for far more money and had a shitty explanation for it. Discontinued speaking to her.
The thread I mentioned that in lead to a great joke from SiamSam
Do you know a guy named Bubba by any chance?
And don’t forget your rabies vaccination. Like Thailand, the Philippines has a big rabies problem, one of the top 10 in the world.
Not to threadshit or try to ruin your optimism, but the “smart” ones will bide their time until you get married, start the immigration process, and get their 2 year green card. Some even wait until they get their 10 year card at which point they no longer need the U.S. spouse for anything and that’s where shit hits the fan.
It’s overly paranoid but there are literally dozens of online communities devoted to watching for and fighting against this very thing.
I’m off to the Philippines in a couple weeks too, with my Thai girlfriend.
We met online, almost 10 years ago and going strong, so this sort of thing can work.
If shes pulling a 10 year con job that’s longer Than the average marriage in United States lasts.
If it’s a 2 year plan I can make sure we don’t buy any fancy cars or houses in that time.
No matter what happens, we’ll all get an interesting story when **drach **returns. Or doesn’t return.
Good luck! Sincerely, not sarcastically.
oh I’m sure I’ll find time to keep you guys posted while I am there.
Well, I don’t know about the romance angle, but the Philippines is one of my favorite places to travel.
I really liked Manila, but I suspect that’s a minority opinion. It’s massive, and the traffic is so bad you need to plan at least two hours for even short trips. My favorite part of Manila is that you can tell a Jeepney is local service if it plays 1980s power ballads. If it’s playing modern dance music and has disco lights, it’s a long-distance express.
Boracay has a strong spring break Cancun vibe. If you’ve ever wanted to get your name on the wall of a bar for doing shots, this is the place to do it (Summerplace, specifically.) The main beach is gorgeous, but definitely crowded and built up, but ti’s still beautiful. The other side of the island is one of the best windsurfing spots in the world-- it’s worth going out there to watch the pros. There is also a smaller, quiet beach a bit further out where you can walk the shores looking for fallen coconuts (note, never hang out under a coconut tree!)Boracay also boasts the most scenic Starbucks in the world, a hobbit-themed restaurant staffed by little people, and Shakey’s Pizza for the nostalgic (yes, they still exist, but only in the Philippines.) The massages on the beach are nice but overpriced. There is a giant second-floor open-air massage parlor that is cheaper but kind of an odd experience as dozens of people share the room with you.
Palawan is amazing. Probably my favorite place on Earth. Puerto Princessa isn’t a tourist paradice, but it is a friendly, relaxed town and it’s easy to get to know people. El Nido is definitely worth the trip to get to, especially as it will likely change dramatically in the near future. For now, it’s a two-street secluded beach town in the most beautiful natural setting you could ask for. The thing to do is go on island hopping tours, where oyu spend the day snorkeling, lunching, and relaxing on a variety of gorgeous islands. Nice people, good food, but do be careful as there are no ATMs (my card stopped working, and I ended up having to do a complex Paypal transaction to pay my hotel bill.) It’s completely worth it.
Enjoy!
Ha! Good one.
In all seriousness, why do you prefer such an expensive and risky way to meet women?
I’m sort of new here so haven’t read your whole posting history but I gather from others’ comments enough to understand why you (or anyone) should be cautious in such a scenario.
Just wanted to make an observation about the excerpt above. Maybe it’s just me, but if anything I’d think such a warning (read: threat) would only cause a possible scammer to not utilize that tactic, which in this case is “asking for money.” In other words, while you seem to believe this was an effective way to weed out people with $$$$ objectives, it may really only serve as a helpful tip for such people - a way to garner some level of trust from you.
In any case, since you seem to be using it as an example to “prove” (or at least bolster the argument that) she’s not a scammer, it would appear that her heeding your warning has indeed garnered some amount of trust on your part. Mission accomplished, I guess, but for… you? Or for her, and she’s thinking “thanks for the tip, sucker!”? 
I also don’t believe it’s necessarily proof of anything that it’s been a year. A year is not at all a long time if the resulting “payoff” is potentially a pretty significantly upgraded lifestyle for the rest of one’s life. Looked at in such a way, it actually is more of a **short **than long con!
All that said, obviously there are people who have wonderful partners and lives that began in a similar way to what you’re doing. Stands to reason that the nightmare stories get the most press.
Expensive? I have easily spent as much on women over 4-6 months who eventually decided not to pursue things any further than a kiss goodnight. That’s not projecting that they “owe me” anything, that’s an after the fact cost benefit analysis.
I am an overweight balding 40 something atheist IT guy/SCA member (www.sca.org) that does not make epic money.
Atheist pretty much wipes out 70% of the dating pool. Plenty of the “non-religious” or religiously ambivalent have other preferences that limit my options. I have been doing online ads for 7 years or so. several great connections but nothing that worked long haul…
A friend of mine introduced me to a couple overseas dating sites. Its completely backwards from US dating sites. In the US women often get 100’s of replies, men get a few. I signed up for one of the sites copied and pasted my OKC profile in and stepped back. 24 hours later I had 40 replies. Granted 25 of those were scammers, but within a few days I had over 100 easily had whittled down to 3-4 women who seem like the real deal, that can type/speak decent english, are attractive to me, and that comply with a couple common sense requests (my scammer tests).
I grew up in a town with 75% Hispanics, all those blonde haired blue eyed girls look the same to me. I go for the dark hair/dark eyes/caramel colored types. Much of my dating history is Hispanics and Asians because of this.
So going somewhere where every woman fits my “type” where your average american male can find himself in a nightclub in Cebu and not pay for a drink all night with half a dozen beautiful women vying for his attention. Granted I have someone waiting for me, but that’s like “plan C” if it flops.
Right.
I don’t think you can look at it in a binary way – (con or not a con). There are various shades of reality in between. Over Skype, it’s very easy for either party to convince him- or herself that it’s “true” romance. (It’s especially easy for someone from a poorer country to convince herself of that.) It’s easy to objectify the other person when you aren’t spending a lot of time together.
The proof is in living together, so once that happens, it’ll be like starting from the beginning. And whether they end up settling in the Philippines or the States, one of the two parties is going to be facing acculturation challenges.
[QUOTE=Lee Q.]
All that said, obviously there are people who have wonderful partners and lives that began in a similar way to what you’re doing. Stands to reason that the nightmare stories get the most press.
[/QUOTE]
Sure. In a way, though, until you spend time together, the situation is still the same chance you have with any other person you’ve just met. The OP shouldn’t let the trouble and expense of traveling all this distance cloud that fact.
I lived in a small town in China with two Western teachers with similar thinking to the OP, let’s call them Doug and Rick. Both were looking for a life-partner, and both had pretty big strikes against them at home-- short, overweight, and not particularly high earning prospects, among other potential pitfalls.
Doug took pride in taking home a different woman every night, usually paid companions, with the occasional teen trying to piss of her parents. He racked up literally hundreds of women, but his attempts to find a partner were less successful. Inevitably, he’d chose a young top 5% student who, in the end, would turn out to be immature, emotionally unstable, and not particularly good companionship (not surprising for a teenager you can’t talk to). He got laid a lot, but he ended up with a lot of drama, but most of the eligible women saw pretty immediately that he was pretty scummy (and he was) and kept their distance.
Rick was the nicest guy on the planet-- funny, charming and smart. And he quickly realized that he didn’t want to date people half his age, but that people get married young and all the women his age were taken. He gave it a genuine effort, and by all rights he should have found someone. It was a poor town, he had a steady job and good passport, he was fine dating the “less than model” types and he spoke great Chinese. But he still faced a lot of false starts and dry spells, and he hasn’t found his partner yet.
My point isn’t that it can’t happen. I have a friend who fell in love with his travel agent, and they have a kid and a happy life now. I have another friend who married his drug buddy. They do lots of drugs together. It can work.
But a wider pool is just a wider pool. It doesn’t really make all of the rest any easier. Any personal flaws you have are still there. Any real romance is going to still be a lot of work. And anything that seems too good to be true still is. It’s kind of like suddenly becoming more attractive here. Yes, you’ll have more prospects, but getting it right still isn’t easy- look at how much relationship drama celebrities end up in.
Also, the Philippines isn’t a great choice if you are avoiding religion, as its probably the most Christian country on the planet. Also note that intercultural relationships come with more than enough complicated areas of mismatch (family obligation, in particular, is a huge one) to more than make up for the BS you think you are skipping out on with American women. Gritting your teeth though church every Sunday is a lot easier than gritting your teeth every day when your mother-in-law moves in.